GREAT FRENCH ATTACK.

Taihape Daily Times, Issue 220, 30 July 1917, Page 6

GREAT FRENCH ATTACK.

MORONVILLERS CREST WON. ENEMY. PLANS FORESTALLED. V London, July 16. While the flags were waving and the rockets blazing all over France in honour of the national fete, writes Keuter's correspondent at French headquarters, the battle for the viewpoints of the Champagne front was renewed on the Moronvillers Heights, a chain of five flat-topped bills, linked by high saddles. This plateau dominates the eastern sector of the battlefield from Nogent lAbbesse to the further bank of the Suippe. The highest point is Mont Haut, nearly 100 ft, which is flanked to the westward by Mont Blond and Mont Cornillet. The first great battle of April brought the French over the' cfest of this group, but except for Mont Cornillet the whole of which the French have held for some time, the northern slopes of the chain remained in the hands of the Germans, who had obstinately clung on just below the crests in the hope of regaining them by a lucky dash, and at two points, namely, on the saddle between Mont Blond and Mont Haut, they held before the attacks on strong positions giving at least, partial views over the French side of the battlefield • below. The Germans had brought three divisions into line, and in anticipation of an attack which was to be made on the whole five-mile; front they carried out much work on their shelters and northward, in which attacking battalions and reserves'massed for assault. The most difficult port of the enterprise, the capture of Mont Haut, was entrusted to a Hanoverian division which -had been specially reTTearsed for the work.

TREMENDOUS BOMBARDMENT The Germans, whose artillery was strongly reinforced, furiously bomDarded the French positions, night and day, until the French signal for assault was given at eight o'clock in the evening. The objectives of the attacking battalions were carelully restricted. An advance of 300 yards on a front of 600 yards"" was ordered on Teton. During three or four -hours preceding the attack the ground on both sides dividing the crests received as severe a shelling as so limited an area ever received in the war. The Germans poured avalanches of high-, explosive shells on to the French positions at Mont Blond, while the French swept the German works over the crest with tornadoes of fire. The bombardment reached a pitch of intense violence an hour before the attack.

Above the crests and slopes of Mont Blond and Mont Haut mingled smoke and dust hung in the air in solid banks. Great mountains of smoke fcept leaping'up behind the crestline, where the French shells were bursting in German trenches. It w»g scarcely conceivable that men could Jive in that hideous turmoil; still less that they should coolly await the order to leave the remains of their shelters to dash through the midst of it. "When the moment came they made

one bound of it. Nothing could be seen of the French waves of assault in the hurricane shell-bursts, but news was flashed back within half an hour that the French Infantry had' taken the whole"bf their objectives—the saddle between Mont Blond and Mont Haut. besides a portion on Mont Haut itself, in from three to six minutes. GERMAN FIREWORKS DISPLAY. A panicky outburst of German rockets and red and yellow light signals from behind the crest immediately after the "attack revealed the progress the French were making. The Germans calling for help with all the fireworks they possessed. The French generar in command afterwards described the battle from the observer's point of view as a "Fourteenth of July", fireworks show. This was justified, because during the whole battle the evening sky was con-' tinually lit up by rockets and flares of all and colours, showing that the enemy was hard-pressed, and desperately needing reinforcements and more artillery support.

Meanwhile the. French departure trenches on the slopes of Mont Blond ■were being transformed into a" sea of milky vapour, in which even the shellbursts were invisible. What resembled serpents of white smoke with leads of fire wandered methodically to and fro across the battlefield, dragging after them a thickening cloud of woolly vapour made of their own' expanding bodies, which gradually hid the ground as effectively as if a roof iad been built over it. The Germans evidently felt the loss of vision keenly. Five of their sausage balloons appeared on the skyline extraordinarily low, and so close that a special squadron of German aeroplanes had to tie sent r nt to protect them.

Taking all risks, these monsters hung in the sky for over an hour, going down hurriedly when the French aeroplanes seared them. It was a last desperatte effort to see what the

French were doing in the sea of smoke, but they could have made out nothing. Several hundred prisoners were captured, 300 within an hour at Mont Blond alone. The first enemy counterattack was made within two hours, and failed completely. The French at present hold their gains intact, and the German plan for the recapture of Moronvillers Heights has been successfully forestalled, through the capture or destruction" of the enemy's departure line.